Why Hillary Clinton didn’t do Sunday shows after Benghazi

So far, the only high-ranking member of Obama administration to suffer politically from Benghazi is Susan Rice, who withdrew from consideration for Secretary of State late last year after blowback for reciting errant talking points on the Sunday shows after the attacks.

But Rice’s unwanted place at the center of the Benghazi firestorm raises one tantalizing question:

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Why was she the administration’s point woman with the press — or, more to the point: Why wasn’t Hillary Clinton, Ambassador Chris Stevens’ boss, the messenger?

Rice told NBC’s Brian Williams that Clinton was simply too tired to endure the grueling ordeal of five morning shows — the so-called “Full Ginsburg” — shortly after pulling her name in mid-December, under withering criticism from Congressional Republicans.

So the U.N. ambassador, who wanted to use the platform to tamp down protests over a U.S.-produced anti-Islamic video in the Muslim world, stepped up.

“Secretary Clinton had originally been asked by most of the networks to go on,” Rice told Williams. “She had had an incredibly grueling week dealing with the protests around the Middle East and North Africa. I was asked. I was willing to do so. It wasn’t what I had planned for that weekend originally, but I don’t regret doing that.”

But three sources close to the situation tell POLITICO that it was less a matter of fatigue, and more a matter of Clinton not wanting to go on the shows.

The aides said Clinton had a “default” policy of rejecting all Sunday requests.

None of the officials was willing to speculate on why the secretary wouldn’t make an exception after such an extraordinary event — or whether Clinton had wanted to avoid a controversy that could have compromised her political future.

West Wing officials would have little compunction about asking Clinton’s successor John Kerry to appear on the shows — but Clinton enjoyed a level of autonomy from West Wing meddling unique in the recent history of her department. Obama’s top aides, deferential and wary of reigniting old tensions with his 2008 foe, didn’t force the issue and scrambled to find a stand-in for Clinton.

“[Hillary] has a standing refusal [to do Sunday shows]. She hates them. She would rather die than do them,” said one aide on condition of anonymity. “The White House knows, so they would know not to even ask her.”